Various different parameters affect printing performance. For instance, in regard to printing text, whether font substitution and font bitmapping are used can affect the speed with which the print job is completed and the quality of the printout. With respect to printing of images, other factors, such as whether resolution down-sampling is used and whether data compression is used during the printing process, can affect speed and print quality.
Generally speaking, print speed and print quality are inversely related. Specifically, when the printing parameters are set so as to provide high speed printing, the print quality may not be high. Similarly, if the printing device is configured for high quality printouts, it may take longer for the printouts to be created. Therefore, printing device design typically involves balancing print speed with print quality. In fact, printing devices are typically tuned by the manufacturer for a particular anticipated type of use. This tuning involves adjustment of the various printing parameters, such as those noted above, to achieve the desired printing performance for the anticipated use. For example, for machines that are marketed to persons that primarily print documents for personal (as opposed to commercial) use, the printing device may be tuned toward the high speed end of the speed/quality spectrum. If, on the other hand, the machine is to be marketed to persons that wish to print commercial documents (e.g., sales brochures), the printing device may be tuned toward the high quality end of the speed/quality spectrum.
Although tuning in this manner is appropriate for persons who intend to use their printing devices for single, specific applications, many persons may wish to use their printing devices for various different types of applications, some calling for high speed printing, others calling for high quality printing. For example, if a person wishes to print out a long document in draft form, that person may care less about quality than about print speed. The same person, however, may care more about print quality than speed, when printing a copy of a digital image of his or her family. Unfortunately, most printing devices are not adjustable in this manner. This normally is due to the fact that the firmware of conventional printing devices is static, i.e., not adapted for adjustment. Although the driver software sold along with the printing devices may allow the user to select between print speed and print quality, these selections typically do not change the internal settings of the printing device due to this static nature of the firmware. Accordingly, such selections normally do little to affect the print speed or quality.
Although a printing device could be constructed that provides for adjustment of the various low-level printing parameters, such as those noted above, such adjustability may not be desirable to many users. This is due to the fact that many users lack the imaging savvy to understand how the various parameters affect printing performance. Even where the user does understand this, the user may not wish to be bothered with having to individually adjust each of the print parameters due to the tedium involved with such an endeavor. This is particularly true where the user needs to adjust the parameters on a frequent basis, for instance where the user alternately prints high speed and high quality printouts. Furthermore, literally hundreds of different parameter setting combinations are possible. Therefore, the user may need to experiment extensively with the parameters until arriving upon a setting combination that is suitable for a particular print job.
From the foregoing, it can be appreciated that it would be desirable to have a system and method for controlling printing performance. Furthermore, it can be appreciated that it would be desirable to have such a system and method with which this performance can be adjusted with a relatively simple user interface to simplify the adjustment process.